duncan will be on with maria bartiromo. we thought an exclusive. but, look, he was on the food network's "ace of cake" the team

from charm city cakes created an nyse cake for his birthday. >> his wife ordered it. that's a replica of the nyse for his birth day. this is one of your favorite shows. we've got to get you on the show. >> duncan gets to be on the show and i don't? >> unjust. we've got fix that. e-mail "power lunch," tell us. >> there he is with all of his kids, replicas of the kids in front of the nyse. >> the scale is wrong. they're too big for the building. >> on the other hand -- >> how you cut that thing into pieces. one really tall section of that cake. >> i bet it's really good. >> right. >> happy birthday. >> indeed, duncan, happy birthday. that does it for us on "power lunch." market's trying to better its position. see if it can do it on "street signs." >> see you tomorrow.

2:00 on wall street where stocks are struggling yet again. the fourth triple digit plunge in the past seven trading days. what do the markets want? one potential hurdle today the bernanke confirmationing could be cleared this hour. watch the vote here, discussion ongoing right now. you see kay bailey hutchison from texas speaking. could toyota's recall be the beginning of a new wave of misery for people who drive any kind of car? did the rush to go greenbackfire big time? welcome to the program. this is "street signs." i'm erin burnett. thanks for spending part of your afternoon with us. we want to ask you, at the top of our show to weigh in on what we are going to admit is an unscientificle. . we'd like you to participates. do you feel safe enough to buy a toyota right now? that goes for lexus lovers, too. anybody at toyota, including

lexus. yes or no? e-mail us streetsigns@cnbc.com. reach us on our regular e-mail. stocks are recovering a bit. down 165. still a triple-digit loss. ben bernanke expected to be confirmed. we're awaiting that vote momentarily. earnings better than ex. the market does not overall seem to celebrate it or care. bob pisani at the big board. mary thompson back at earning central. bob, what do traders are want to hear to have the market go up? >> it sounds like we have a problem with bob's mike. we're going to mary instead. mary, first of all, set us up with the overall earnings appear to be better than expected, right? >> it's true, erin, they have been better than expected. even as the reporting season marks the first time in ten quarters that s&p 500 members are going to report profit growth, the same can't be said for the index that tracks their stocks. take a look at this chart. keep in mind, i think we have the chart here, since the s&p 500, actually, since alcoa

kicked off earnings season back -- there we go -- january 11th the s&p 500 is down over 5.3%. keep in mind, there's an old saying, that goes, earnings drive the market. this earnings season the markets -- earnings are competing with concerns that include a number of things, economic implications, per s persistently high unemployment and sovereign debt issues. all of this overshadowing the fact that profits at 77% of the 197 s&p 500 companies reported so far have come in above analysts' forecasts. add 66% reporting better than expected revenue, earnings growth for index members who report for the fourth quarter so far. a whopping 483%. when at end of the day went the quarter's wrapped up, analysts surveyed expecting the profits for s&p 500 companies will be up 203% from the fourth quarter of last year. keep in mind nose numbers are skewed by the financial sector's

dismal performance in the fourth quart of 2008. take out that sector's profits for the '09 quarter and earnings growth will be modest, 13% expect. still strong growth been but not strong enough to get this market starts again. back to you. >> thank you very much, mary. mary laying out the earning side of the story. we have bob pisani back. i put the question to you again. earnings are going to come in, better than expected, bernanke's going to get nominated, why does nobody seem to care? >> reporter: there are other external issues worrying them. one, how do they factor in the sovereign debt issues? the reason the market's weak today has to do with the fact greek bonds are continuing to widen out, s&p made negative comments about the usk stabilit this morning. you've got the situation we know it's going to cost more to finance their debt and our debt and everybody's debt. how much more is a problem problem. they want to know what's the rules of the game when investing in the financial industry and

investing in the health care industry. they don't know because the government is changing the rules. getting some certainty on that front would make a difference in everybody's investing attitude. s&p 500, off the low. i think erin's right, most traders that i've taked to feel the modest midday bounce due to expectations mr. bernanke will be confirmed. here's your little bit of a rally. else where, a lot of issues go on here. tech land, disappointment with techs this morning, lsi, motorola. we'll get a big raft of major tech companies reporting. we'll get more clarity. we've had the big run-up ahead of the earnings report in all of the big tech names. a lot is sell on the news and not just disappointment. >> thank you, bob pisani. as you raise a point, some sell on the news and external factors. but let's tackle this more. why is the market continuing to drop and drop and drop when a

lot of the news coming out is not so bad? why are trader as afraid? joining us two not afraid to tell you the truth. jim and fred. fred, let me start with you, i know you're saying, housing, housing is a big thing to watch here. maybe that's the problem. >> i think that's something that we look forward to. why's the market spooked? it's uncertainty. as we get into the neck couple of months we could see case-shiller numbers head down. we've seen them on a nonseasonally jump down. uncertainly in the housing market and that overlays risk markets taking it on the chin the last week or so. >> jimmy, you're saying we're not getting confidence, well, from your perspective from president obama. you point to his comment that he's going to double exports in the last five years. >> he had me, then he lost me. i was shaking shy head, yes,

then talked about doubling export exports. if he told me we'd all have personal flying machines. what are we going to export besides bonds? look at uaw, such a union hangover involved with all of the things we know o'them woo he can no longer be competitive with the companies. we don't manufacture anymore. i do think the speech last night is only a small part of the -- what i think is the most important we went for 11 months everyone's saying we're due to correct, every time we're about to correct, the weak dollar trade came in and we would lean on that crutch and stocks would fail from correcting. that's not there anymore. we're due for a 10% correction. >> peter ran the numbers on the export issue. last time we doubled exports, how many years do you think it took us do it? >> my guess, 15, 20, 25 years.

>> it was 12, close with 15. it did take 12, and that included the big boon in the late 1990s. >> we can't -- we're not going to get back into five year. it's crazy. >> fred what about the doubling of exports? the president says he's setting a new goal, setting some kind of group to focus on doing that. what would we make to jim's question? >> we're not going to make things, as jim says. we're going to export services and that's one of the challenges. one of the key exports of services is financial services for the u.s. that's something that he doesn't seem to be encouraging in terms of pushing banks to be smaller, rather than big. >> you said to your point we export financial services which raise the question of whether woorn going weir going to regulate them in a smart way or a stupid way. fred, one thing you like? >> jpmorgan. it's tough right now economic

uncertainty and policy uncertainty is overweighing the market. look at what this company and the other big banks can do and will do as we emerge, it's powerful for the bottom line and shareholders. >> jimmy, final word to you, if -- what will it take from here for the market to go up? i mean, something. anything. >> trim the hims. we have to put in the correction. we have to satisfy the correction gods go to 1035, 1040 in s&ps. from a valuation standpoint it makes them more attractive and people start poring back in. the end of date there's a lot of selling at the end. to me it means that the underlying movements to the downside. i don't think we can save it until we put in right amount. >> a quick question to each 0 you. steve liesman will have the latest. we're expecting the vote at any time regarding ben bernanke's nomination, it is expected that ben bernanke will be renominated. let us just suppose that he does not. we remember that day of the bonus vote earlier this year. what happens to stocks?

>> if he didn't get renominated they go down. >> jim? >> no question. they want too go down anyway, that's the path of least resistance. >> everyone's expecting him to be nominated, and they're already down. thank you. we are awaiting for the senate to vote on ben bernanke's confirmation. steve liesman, as promised, is in washington with the latest. steve, how's the count going? >> language on. i'm going to turn off kyle. he was just talking. he'sen declares senate republican. >> what did he say? >> debated at this however over the fill buster to stop the nomination of ben bernanke. kyle was talking negatively of bernanke. senator schedule stod vote at 3:20. if they end the filibuster they go to vote on nomination. all indications are bernanke has enough votes to went both but will win with influential opponents. >> even after bear stearns

failed chairman bernanke did little to prepare for additional failures. in other words, bernanke fiddled while our markets burned. >> shelby is in the minority for how the senate's likely to vote. but he's in the majority within his party. developing story. talked about with kyle. bernanke could win a second term without the support of the party whose president, president bush, first nominated him. 42% of republican senators support the chairman. 11-15. bernanke could get as many as 70 votes and the senate sentiment reflected by democratic senator bob menendez. >> i will vote yes because, in my view what we should not do is change leadership at the fed at a time when what we need most is a steady experienced hand at what appears to be the very beginning of an economic recovery. >> so, ending the fight over bernanke does not end the fight over the fed with regulatory

reform about to heat up and the role of the fed a big part of that debate, you might know in an hour who runs the fed. but we won't necessarily know the role of the fed. >> steve, when you talk -- this is a tough way to slice the cookie, i'm curious, when you look at who's up for re-election in the senate, can you break down in that group how is it swaying? how's that going? >> let me get my spreadsheet going here. it will take a second to find it. the republicans who are up for re-election, were the least likely to support -- why isn't that happening? hold on a second. >> what a shocker. >> there it is. 63% -- sorry, 78% of republicans who were up for re-election are opposing bernanke. and that compares with 44% of republicans not up for re-election. if you're up for re-election, you are less likely to support the fed chairman for a second term. by statistically meaningful marriagen. some might say a moment

where we can ask the question, whether people are voting for what's best for the country or best for themselves. >> do you to ask that question? >> i like to maintain optimism. >> you're still young. you still have hope. >> do the right thing. >> i can tell you that it's overwhelming and very obvious. and that's the way vote is going. i'm surprised by the republicans and i've heard people talking in sort of the corridors of pow here about how amazing it is that the republicans may, in fact, if we get five or six more republican nays here, the republican s will be a minority supporter of bernanke. >> they put in office. >> yeah. >> i guess they think america forgot about that. steve liesman, thank you. >> a pleasure. >> there's my cynicism, it came back. next on the show, toyota recall just the tip of the iceberg? opens the flood gates as the drive to go green put the world's auto fleet on the line. vote in our streetsigns@cnbc.com poll today. it's only open for one hour.

vote now. would you buy a toyota right now? just a yes or a no. we make it simple streetsigns@cnbc.com. the president issuing his own ruling against the supreme court last night. pretty incredible moment when he came out and said i know there's separation of powers and all, but he believes the high court has given foreign governments and companies an invitation to buy america's elections. is he right?

>> ford motor putting an exclamation point on turnaround efforts. posted $2.7 billion profit for the fourth quarter. they had $868 million. by the way that compares to $6 billion loss a year ago. i mean, talk about a change in fortunes. ford shares off a fraction today. over the past year the stock surged 450%. haling production of a truck in china because of the same gas pedal issue that's causing toyota's recall, which everybody is in the united states as well. phil lebeau in dearborn, michigan with more on the cross currents. >> reporter: a lot of different stories revolving around what's happening with act secelerator pedals being recalled or inspected at toyota and now at ford. ford first, allen mulally indicated today that ford has stopped production on one

vehicle, a vehicle they've made 1600 of in china, because the supplier for toyota's accelerator pedals is the same supplier for ford. ford is holding production, checking to make sure there are no problems with the accelerator pedal. >> what looks to be a similar design and also combining that with the fact that, in this joint venture that we have there, they switched suppliers, using the same supply that toyota's using that was enough for us stop production now and then continue the investigation. >> but you haven't found anything faulty at this point? >> no. we've had anam allous behavior. >> reporter: i asked allen about ford offering incentives to toyota, lexus, honda and acura customers who cross shop with toyota, offering a thousand to dom in trade in their japanese automobile for a ford. domestic automakers trying to

take advantage of problems at ford. take a look at shares of ford, the stock pulling back today. considering the run it's had, it's marl you'natural you'll se stock pull back. expanded the recall for stickiness with accelerator pedals including europe and client na, 2 million vehicles, they have not stopped production, impacting those two areas of the world. the pedal supplier held a press conference today, a conference call, with analysts saying the supplier is not the problem here. the problem is with the design of the accelerator pedal. they are working on toyota with a fix. cts out of elkhart, indiana, trying to get ahead of the storm that is brewing regarding these pedals. the stock under pressure. there are a lot of moving parts with the story. compounded by the fact that whatever solution toyota and cts come up with, they're working on one, they believe they're close, they have to sent this to the national highway traffic safety

administration for approval so it can be put into vehicles that toyota is building. that's not a quick process ordinarily, even if you speed it up you have to wonder how long it will take toyota to get the production lines up and going again and cts corp, how quickly can it come up with the accelerator pedals that need to be installed on 2.3 million on the road and others being built? >> phil, thank you. steve liesman instant messaged me something important. i want to share it with you. talking about jon kyl, the republican speaking and saying all sorts of things implied he did not like ben bernanke. end of the speech, jon kyl will be voting for ben bernanke. why? he's afraid of who else president obama may nominate. na goes as a republican yes for ben bernanke. as technology advances in vehicles are we likely to see more recalls of in the future? an interesting takeaway from the story phil's been reporting all

day. is the toyota recall the way of the future? director of auto research at ish research. good to see you. >> likewise. >> so it's interesting, is this, in a sense, toyota maybe take this further than others would. but the tip of the iceberg. cars, used to be automatic seat belts that would break when it goes back and forth. now more things are electronic. >> that's the thing, erin. we're seeing, in this situation, where toyota has a system called drive by wire and it has replaced traditional gearbox and politicnisms that ordinarily would be part of the accelerator system. and you can run into a lot of, you know, issues with length electronics. there's a pro and conwhether it's bettor i have amechanical issue or a transmit issue. >> are we seeing more drive by

wire as they call it? that used to be in the most expensive of cars. but are you seeing that further down the line now? does that also increase the likelihood of a massive recall? >> we are seeing it infiltrate more and more. toyota has probably the widest spread applications of a drive by wire system right now. we have not seen it penetrate into brake by wire that still is mechanical process because they are concerned about safety issues as it relates to breaking the car. we see technology start out at the most expensive vehicles and filter their way down to standard, nonpremium vehicles. >> you mentioned, talking about some things like the blind spot technology, things that create poe sentential for more issues because of more technology. what about going green, batteries, electric as opposes to the regular engine. >> there's, i mean, a ton of issues with hybrid electric

vehicles. there's a lot more mechanics that go into that. more electronics associated with that. so as vehicles go more green, you can get even more difficulties with some of these electronic systems. of course, one of the reasons that they're on more hybrid vehicles, because the wires don't weigh as much. you can make a lighter vehicle and compensate for the weight of the battery. there's all different things. technology can play a very good part in vehicles. but it also has some downside to it as well. >> thank you very much. good to see you. make some people think more about the whole going green. weigh in on our unscientific poll today on "street signs." do you feel safe enough to buy a toyota right now? as we've been saying that goes for lexus lovers, still, putting your nose in the area it doesn't apply to you yet. that is the recall. toyota, yes or no, buy one now? e-mail us yes or no streetsigns@cnbc.com. has the supreme court opens the floodgates?

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presidentosama bin lad bin ladentaking aim at u.s. supreme court last night in his state of at union address. >> last week the supreme court reversed a century of law that a believe will open the floodgates for special interests including foreign corporations to spend without limit in our elections. >> justice alito, as we all know, said at that time that was not true. he didn't yell it, though. of course the president's referring to last week's ruling that got so much coverage on

citizens united versus the fec. this struck down a 63-year ban on letting companies or unions spend on election campaigns. not donating directly to the candidate but ads or anything else. does this open floodgates for foreign companies to buy american elections? let's talk about that now. joining us to do that is josh israel, project director with the center for public integrity and steve hersting, vice president and cofounder of politics. this is an interesting argument, josh, first, explain why you think the president may have a point here and i guess you start with that. then i want to talk about which companies we're talking about. >> sure thing. basically what this ruling did is it allows corporations to spend money on television ads in support or opposition to candidates. it does not make a distinction between what corporations can and can't. there's some existing rules that

prohibit foreign citizens from influencing u.s. elections. but the challenge here is that there are a lot of companies that are based in the united states subsidiaries of foreign companies and some cases subsidiaries of companies owned by foreign governments. as long as those companies are run by american citizens, nothing in in ruling seems like it would stop those entities from spending and that may not in fact be in the interest of americans but in the interests of the foreign entity that owns them. >> before we get steve in here, josh, give examples of companies you're talking. in particular, pick two governments americans would be urn comfortable with, china and saudi arabia. >> yeah. chinese governments owns a substantial portion of the lenovo company which purchased the entire ibm pc operation in

the u.s. the saudi government owns a number of entities, including the saudi refining company in houston which has a 50% stake along with shell in the company and provides a substantial portion of shell's oil. these would be entities that one could imagine might be concerned about the interests of the countries that own them, as well as, you know, good government. >> right. steve, i mean, clearly in both examples, different reasons they may concern americans, saudi arabia influencing american energy policy, clearly may not -- if they were buying into an election, maybe they wouldn't want somebody who wanted american energy independence. you think this is overblown concern? >> it is overblown. mr. israel, josh, makes it sound as though this opinion is preventing the president from engaging in international relations. but there ises a campaign

finance case. what the supreme court held here is that -- >> and it looks like we have a bit of a problem with steve's picture. are you still there, josh? >> yes. >> i think what steve was going to try to say, steve if you can hear me and i'm not getting it perfect, forgive me. what he was trying to say, this definition of a foreign national includes and has been proven in the past to include companies. so that this risk of companies that foreign governments own a bit of having influence is not real and there's legislation or laws that would prevent that. >> that is true to some extent. there are laws that would apply to some corporations. if the corporation is not based in the u.s., obviously they're not going to be able to influence u.s. elections. the gray area at best here, what if the company's an american company, say, citgo usa but a

wholly-owned subsidiary of a foreign company, a multi national corporation like citgo, owned by the government of venezuela? i mean, certainly this is not going to take away the president's ability to engage in foreign policy. >> right. >> but it may mean that companies whose interests are also the interests of foreign governments may be free to spend whatever they want in our elections. >> thank you very much, josh. we appreciate it. >> sure thing. >> our apologies in the ether to steve. let noise whus know what you th the issue, viewers, that is talking about the ketchup and the ipad. did someone put that in the same sentence in the same tease? exclusive with the man trying to fix the most corrupt banking system in the world. no, it is not tim geithner.

welcome back to "street signs." rick santelli here. one place to begin if we look at charts, and that is the dollar index. you can see it's up a quarter of a cent today. to put it in real perspective, let's pull out one of the elements, the euro and look at six-month chart. i defy you find a lower euro level there. you won't. these are the lowest levels since, well, mid-july which makes it slightly more than six months. very interesting. a lot of this, of course, thoos do with all of the credit issues around the globe, specifically in the euro zone area and the uk. but, hey, america's got many of the same problems. next chart, it's a ten year. not a great shake here, virtually unchanged. but to put energy context, one week ago today a greek ten-year bond was issued -- was yielding about 607.

today issuing 712 to 713. that pretty much sums it up. back to you, erin. >> thank you. time to stop trading. jim is here. he's got a lot to talk about. >> always. >> why? you want to talk about ketchup with heinz and the ipad. >> there had been a tremendous am of option activity in heinz. i want to say, while i like heinz stock, at this point if there is not a takeover, it is just a sale. it done have the growth that warrants this particular multiple in a group. it's not general mills. so i think that, unless there is some sort of fire real soon, this one will retreat because it is just on takeoverness. >> even everyone's been raving about the organic ketchup, it has real sugar and not that terrible whatever corn syrup. >> the reason i said this because i watch you and mark joke around about this. i did want to point out as good tasting as the ketchup may be,

in the end, tater t ochlth ts, we do not want to be in the stock without a bid. >> there you go. a fair point. what about the ipad and apple? a lot of criticism today, lots of jokes about the name but real questions as to whether this thing is great bits of a lot of things but not an amazing thing in and of itself. >> i hear cannibalization, people saying this is not the revolution area product. here's the way i have known an toll trade. you get introduction, then you get the profit shaking hedge funds and the short-selling hedge funds and the public panicking out because they believe the product isn't good, six months we realize the product's great, not three months because you have to introduce it, make it's not the right price scheme. this is the life cycle of the way apple trades. do not get disheartened. it has always done this. do not make this the judgment on the project.

>> you can't see it, but it was here, it was left here by a company that rang the bell. see the red pen? sontandare. >> it had been a favorite bank of sheila bair. but you just heard rick santelli talking about greece. you tend to look at these domino-like. is it greece and is it portugal and spain? this company has a good yield. it is a very good banker but we know how things work. asian contagion players from '9. '97 know these things do not stop. a great bank but presumably in what's getting to be a bad neighborhood. >> let's talk about the state of the union. i know -- i don't know what stood out to you. everyone stood up on nukes, offshore drilling, the president supported it. he wants more exports. maybe we don't get as man q. as he said we would get. anything that you thought was tradeable off of that big picture? >> i want to point out i thought

the nuke thing was just the boiler plate nuke, a research director, energy secretary really more of a professor. offshore oil and gas, the issue is onshore, natural gas wasn't mentioned, got to be careful about that. the most momentous thing that happened he embraced geithner. while viewed as a tool of wall street is in reality a guy who saved the banking system by making them raise equity with serious stress tests that everybody realizes weren't a joke. we want geithner in because there's no geithner rule to break up the banks it's just the volcker rule. had he snubbed geithner and put a bear hug around volcker, the bank group everybody the only group that's up, would have been in shreds. >> tim geithner looked exhausted. >> he's a good man. >> he couldn't take a bye and say i want to hang out with my family? ever a night after what he went through that he wanted to do it, last night. >> kangaroo court and show trial

with a guy who is substance. it's easier to not be substantive and take those questions. point of order with stu symington, this is a trav industry of the hearings. do people think geithner's a big joke who are goes to a lot of washington redskins and flat games? which in itself would mean that he has lost his mind. >> be careful. some people support those teams, jim. >> who? who? >> eagles are not so hot either. >> the phillies were the world champions. look, i think that, in terms of the washington nationals, this stock market and the redskins, all three are what i call no-shows. >> we've got to go. picking on those teams. toyota, yes or no? jim has tom ferrell, president and ceo of dominion resources speaking of energy. 6:00 and 11:00 on cnbc. speaking of home states near washington, d.c., maryland is mine, the state wants to be on

the front lines of one of the biggest terror threats facing our country. the governor's going to create 28,000 jobs in the process. we're going to speak to him next.

one of the biggest threats to america's security is cyberattacks. high-ranking defense officials say would-be terrorists will attack our internaet and communication systems. one state wants to be on the front lines protecting america and create jobs doing it. here is martin o'malley. good to see you again. >> good to see you. >> talking about a cyber -- what are you doing in cyberzmurts you want to create 30,000 jobs.

where do you start? >> start with our strrns. look at maryland, the federal assets located here in maryland, you have places like national security administration, places like nist and other federal acronyms but they are all doing very important work related to defending our nation's computer systems from hackers, from terrorists, from other governments that want to probe our system, see if they can disrupt or system, see if they can hack into bank accounts, see if they can steal patents and other secrets. maryland in a sense, erin, already is the epicenter of cybersecurity. what we have probed, with a broad group of business people, small and large, academic institutions and community colleges as well as federal partners, is to design an economic development strategy that leverages that cybersecurity mission to create

own more jobs in maryland. last year we led the nation in terms of computer system design in terms of the number of people that we've hired one of the mo skilled structures in the country. we need to build on that. which, by the way, can also create jobs here. >> what level of education do you have to have to be a key player in fighting cyberattacks? it would seem like to the untechnologically educated, like myself, that would need advanced programming. >> it requires federal security clearances and a background check and everything that goes with that. so, yes, make no mistake about it, this is a highly skilled field but it is a growing field. and businesses that serve or federal government, the private contractors and the like want to

be located near big assets and places where they can recruit people as workforce that comes out of their federal service to do the work in these private companies. but beyond those sort of high-end ph.d. big brain highly trained math and technical people you have a whole network that has to support that in terms of service jobs and everything else that goes into making a diverse economy go. this is not to say that everyone in our state and coming out of our community colleges can be trained for a career in cybersecurity but it does say the more people we can train to fill those opportunities, the stronger we'll be as a state and the more we'll be able to expand our economy. we would rather fill those jobs with young people coming out of maryland community colleges and maryland four-year colleges than have to imfor them from other places. but the key here is to build from our strengths. >> that truly would be ironic in engineers providing

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welcome back to "street s n signs" i'm diana olick in washington. the treasury department is streamlining its loan modification program now requiring troubled borrowers to get their documents in up-front before even the trial period begins. assistant treasury secretary herb allison admits the program has been challenging and has a long way to go. only a brief mention though of housing in the president obama's state of the union speech last night, saying the administration

will, quote, step up refinancing that so that homeowners can move into more affordable mortgage, unfortunately he gave no details and unemployment is juicing the foreclosure numbers in some unexpected cities. honolulu, minneapolis and seattle, saw foreclosure rates more than double over the national pace but cities in the sunbelt continue to dominate. the 20 metro area, the top ones are all in california, nevada, arizona and florida. check back with the realty check next tomorrow morning at 11:5 z. until then go to the blog realtycheck.cnbc.com. >> thank you very much, diana. trying to help his nation grow into an economic superpower, despite some recent fears about country. can nigeria overcome challenges? including a weak banking system, clashes between muslims and christians and being declared by the u.s. as a security risk state in light of the christmas day attempted bomb to become one the world's biggest economies in the next decade. top economic voice central bank

governor. we appreciate it. lots of challenges for nigeria not in light of the recent headlines but in the midst of significant reform that you've been spearheading do you think that the next ten years nigeria's on traone the world's or one of the 20 biggest economies? >> yes, i think so, erin. i think that we do have great potentials that have been set up and realized. i think that we do recognize where the problems are and that is the most important thing. this is a country of 150 million people. we've got significant natural gas resources and oil resource. there's a huge infrastructure deficit. the real challenge is governance and i do think it is a major recognition right new that needs to be fixed and once that is fixed i think that we're away. >> one thing that you are doing now and your role as a top banker in the country is changing who can own banks. i mean, obviously there's been a

lot of corruption in nigeria and in the financial system and one thing that you are trying to do i guess is going along with paul volcker trying to do in the united states and that is not let individuals own big stakes in banks? >> yes. i think it's extremely important to look at structures. the banks need to be institutionalized and governance is important. corruption in the nigerian banking system is reflective of the general corruption in society and it's got to be rooted out. what we've tried do is make sure that consequences in practices and also get mixture that ceos are held accountable and that institutions are broken away from a key syndrome. i totally agree with volcker and obama what they want to do goes to the heart of banking. if banks make deposits from customers we've got to watch what kind of risks they take and what they into with the money. >> a midstt all of the coverage about the attempting bombing on christmas day, obviously

nigeria's been added to some risk lists and there's also been a renewed focus on who's running the country that the president of the country's been out of saudi arabia in the hospital for several months. is this a fair concern, politically, internationally and for people who'd invest in nigeria internationally that there could be a vacuum at the top? >> there's no vacuum. the vice president running the country. as you've seen we have continued with our work, our folks have continued. policies have continued to be implemented. the vice president approves what needs to be approved. we consult with the presidency on all matters and he's running the country. this is basically a matter of politic politicians struggling for who is the next president but reality is that the vice president is in charge of the country at the moment. and have not failed any vacuum at all. on the issue the christmas day bomber, which is very sad and very unfortunate, it's a matter that i think has been handled at the moment by our foreign

service and the united states department of state. we have decided that this is a matter that is best handled diplomatically. it's not a matter that was either supported by nigeria, by the nigerian government or the nigerian people. the investigations are going on. we're cooperating totally with the united states government and we do think that nigeria will be taken off of that list. >> all right, we appreciate you're taking the time to join us and good luck and enjoy the rest of your time in davos. all right. next our toyota poll results but first your "trend of the day."

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